What Yield Means

One of those traffic letters to the Editor appeared in the Idaho Statesman this morning from Karen Bryan:

After almost having several accidents at the intersection of Main Street and Cherry Lane in Meridian, I decided to write this letter. Do the people of Meridian know what the word “yield” means? As I recall, it means stop and wait for oncoming traffic to pass then proceed. There is a difference between “yield” and “merge.”

Actually, “Yield” doesn’t technically mean “stop.” According to Wikipedia:

In road transport, a yield (Canada, Ireland, and the United States) or give way (United Kingdom and many Commonwealth countries) traffic sign indicates that a driver of a vehicle must slow down and prepare to stop if necessary (usually while merging into traffic on another road) but does not need to stop if there is no reason to. A driver who has actually stopped in this situation is said to have yielded the right-of-way to through traffic on the main road. In contrast, a stop sign always requires a full stop.

Now Wikipedia goes on to list several situations where a yield sign might be warranted. The relevant ones include:

1. on a minor road at the entrance to an intersection where it is necessary to assign right-of-way to the major road, but where a stop is not necessary at all times, and where the safe approach speed on the minor road exceeds 10 miles per hour;
2. within an intersection with a divided highway, where a STOP sign is present at the entrance to the first roadway and further control is necessary to the entrance to the second roadway, and where the median width between the two roadways exceeds 40 feet;
3. where there is a separate or channelized right-turn lane, without an adequate acceleration lane;
4. at any intersection where a special problem exists and where an engineering study indicates the problem to be susceptible to correction by use of the yield sign.

Looking at a Google Map of the area, it appears at the Intersection in question has a Y shaped Intersection. Main Street intersects with Cherry at the point it becomes Fairview, the area a Yield would normally go on faces towards Fairview.

Wikipedia also notes:

The same rulebook states that yield signs should not ordinarily be placed to control the major flow of traffic at an intersection

Now, I’m no expert on Meridian driving, but I’ve driven enough on Fairview (mostly by getting lost) to know that a “Yield Sign” before entering is kind of absurd. That is almost always busy. So perhaps the best solution is to change it to a stop sign. There was a probably a time when Meridian could get away with using a Yield Sign for that intersection. That time was probably 5-10 years ago.

This amateur city traffic planning brought to you in part by Google Maps and Wikipedia.